


ad meliora

by SyverneSien



Series: assorted dragon!mumbo fics [1]
Category: Hermitcraft RPF, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Dragon Hybrids, Flying, Gen, Hybrids, Male Friendship, My First Work in This Fandom, Near Death Experiences, No Romance, One Shot, Platonic Relationships, Season/Series 07, Secrets, The End (Minecraft), ender dragon - Freeform, i haven't actually seen season 3 i apologize i just picked a random number, i took creative liberties with mumbo's flying skills for dragon hybrid purposes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-14 17:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29299716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SyverneSien/pseuds/SyverneSien
Summary: Iskall's best friend is part dragon, and he (mostly) doesn't notice.That is, until an unusually draconic Mumbo saves his life in the End.
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s), Oliver Brotherhood & Viktor | Iskall85
Series: assorted dragon!mumbo fics [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2153088
Comments: 16
Kudos: 106





	ad meliora

Iskall is sorting through his chests when he feels a tap on his shoulder and nearly jumps out of his skin. He freezes and begins to turn around, but before he can even see who’s standing there, he hears a shout of, “Hemit Challenges!” and he realizes that it must be Mumbo. Then Iskall sees the tall moustachioed businessman leaning over him and his suspicion is confirmed.

“Mumbo Jumbo, you scared me!” Iskall says with a laugh. “How do you always sneak up on me like that?” His mechanical eye automatically adjusts with a quiet whir so that he can focus on Mumbo despite him being so close to Iskall’s face. Maybe he’s just unobservant, but Mumbo surprises him more than any other Hermit. Mumbo’s not even sneaking around… he’s just naturally quiet, Iskall supposes, which is ironic considering how loud his dapper friend is in conversation.

Mumbo leans back and grins. “I have my ways,” he answers vaguely. “Anyway, I have the perfect challenge for you and I know you love challenging me, so let’s go!” Mumbo tugs on Iskall’s arm and Iskall nearly trips over his own feet.

“Right now?” He’s not upset, just surprised. “No crazy way of getting my attention today?” Iskall lets Mumbo lead him outside, smiling at his friend’s contagious energy, but a little overwhelmed.

“I was already here before I thought about it,” Mumbo admits. “Follow me!” He lets go of Iskall, unfurls his elytra--they’re pretty basic, though Iskall does note that they’ve been styled a bit into the shape of dragon wings--and lights a firework, which sends him blasting into the clouds.

Iskall notices as he takes off that his elytra--upgraded with extra mechanisms that he’d added quite a while ago--are looking a little worse for wear, so he makes a mental note to repair them once he gets home. He’s constantly bumping into things with them, and he doesn’t want the damage to become irreparable. Iskall’s a bit jealous of Mumbo, actually. His friend swoops and soars with the elytra as if he’s been wearing them all his life, from the very moment he first put them on. He’s never seen Mumbo miss a landing, nor mis-time a takeoff.

Ahead of him, Mumbo tucks his elytra in and dives into a gap in the forest. Iskall sets off another firework and follows, narrowly missing a tree as he does so. His feet drag on the ground as he stops, leaving mud on his boots, and he steadies himself against one of the stone pillars of the Hermit Challenges area.

Mumbo’s standing on the dais in front of the redstone lamps, still beaming from ear to ear. “You know the deal,” he says. “You write me a challenge, I write you a challenge, and then we exchange!” Iskall’s surprised that Mumbo hasn’t changed the rules again, and he smiles wryly at that thought.

“Hermit Challenges! Yay!” Iskall replies unenthusiastically, grabbing a feathered quill from a nearby inkpot and a piece of paper. Mumbo goes quiet as he does the same--Iskall has to glance up at him a few times to make sure that he’s still there because if anybody can sneak away into the jungle without Iskall hearing him, it’s Mumbo. He’s beginning to think that he needs to get his ears checked because it’s a bit unsettling sometimes.

_ Find an undiscovered ocean monument. _ That’s what Iskall’s written down. He’s been trying to find one for a little while, though not very seriously, so he might as well make Mumbo do it for him. Iskall pops it in the dispenser on Mumbo’s side and sits down on a large boulder, waiting for his friend to finish.

“There you go!” Mumbo declares, putting his paper in Iskall’s dispenser. “I hope you like it.” He grins toothily and cocks his head, looking at Iskall as a scientist would look at a specimen. It’s a bit odd, but Mumbo’s pretty much always been odd.

Iskall is suddenly filled with a sense of dread at what kind of thing Mumbo is going to make him do. The memory of ‘mine ten thousand blocks’ is still fresh, among other terribly annoying challenges that Mumbo had given him or others. Iskall pushes the button, and when he sees the paper, he’s momentarily stunned, then laughs.

“‘Go End-busting with Mumbo Jumbo’,” Iskall reads, then looks up at the man in question. “You know that you can just  _ ask _ me to go End-busting and I’d be delighted to, yes?” Before Mumbo can reply, Iskall adds, “I know, I know, ‘but Hermit Challenges’!” He pauses. “You are a strange man, Mumbo.” Iskall shakes his head with a quiet chuckle. Then he throws the paper into the fire. “I accept.”

Mumbo does the same, then instantly shoots up into the sky in typical Mumbo fashion. “I’ll meet you at the End portal in half an hour!” 

Iskall sighs, but he hadn’t been planning on doing anything important anyway, so he’s not complaining. End-busting with Mumbo is always enjoyable… or as enjoyable as it can be with his friend ‘accidentally’ throwing valuables into the void every ten minutes. He unfurls his elytra and sets off a rocket, slowly gliding back towards his base to gather supplies.

He’s at the End portal exactly thirty minutes later, by the clock that his cybernetic eye displays, and Mumbo is late by a minute and a half, but Iskall doesn’t mind. Mumbo doesn’t even slow down as he flies towards Iskall, just dives directly into the portal, and Iskall jumps in after him.

It’s like plunging through a bucket of icy water and Iskall gasps for air when he lands on the other side in the cold, void-entrapped realm. He’ll never get used to it--and there Mumbo is, sporting only a suit and yet unbothered by the constant chill of the End. Iskall follows him, and they meet near the pool in the centre of the floating island.

“Pick a direction, any direction,” says Mumbo, and Iskall points in the opposite direction of where they’d gone last time. They each set off a firework and soar into the sky, Iskall trailing a little bit behind his friend. The ground falls away, and soon they’re flying over the open void.

Too late, Iskall realizes that he’d forgotten to repair his elytra.

* * *

It’s in the third End city that things finally go wrong. It’s a precarious one--part of it is completely over the void, but Iskall has done this hundreds of times and he’s not worried. Iskall zooms to one of the towers, narrowly missing where he’s trying to land, and he hears the telltale sound of a shulker attacking as he rounds the bend.

Iskall does a shoddy flip in the air to dodge a shulker bullet, which seems to get Mumbo’s attention from the other side of the city.

“Getting the hang of this flying thing?” Mumbo calls teasingly, his elytra looking even more draconic for some reason, though Iskall’s sure it’s just his imagination.

“You’re not the only one that can zoom around!” Iskall calls back, diving at the shulker to kill it. “I am not very good at your elytra tricks, though, Mumbo. You make it look so easy.”

Mumbo drops into free-fall, does a spin, and lands in front of Iskall.  _ Now that’s just showing off, _ Iskall thinks. “You just need more practice,” Mumbo says, putting a hand on his hip. “I’ve got everything. You?”

Iskall nods. “Off to the next one.” He sets off a firework and shoots into the sky, clipping one wing of his elytra on the tower as he goes. Iskall glances back at it, noticing that a chunk of his wing is missing. But there’s nothing he can really do about it in the middle of the End and he doesn’t want to raise a fuss, so he simply grits his teeth and follows Mumbo, who somehow has gotten ahead of him.

They’re over pure void when Iskall’s wing really starts to tear. He sets off another firework, intent on reaching solid ground before it breaks and slowly realizing just how stupid he’s been. He used to be so cautious of his elytra getting broken in the End… he’s gotten so relaxed over the many times they’ve gone End-busting, and now it’s come back to bite him. 

Mumbo’s just ahead of him when Iskall drops a bit in the air. “Mumbo,” he starts warily, not quite a yell but hopefully loud enough to get Mumbo’s attention. Then there’s a loud snap and he plummets, with not even a moment to curse himself, and he shouts,  _ “MUMBO!” _

It’s a long fall, and Iskall tries his best to get stabilized again, but it’s futile. He ends up on his back and can see Mumbo diving after him, but Iskall’s sure his friend won’t make it. He’s getting colder and colder and slowly starts to black out. Iskall can only really think about how  _ stupid _ he was being by not fixing his elytra. But before he can become fully unconscious, he swears he sees someone reaching for him, but it’s not quite Mumbo… because Mumbo does not have striking purple eyes.

* * *

Iskall jolts awake in a cold sweat, suddenly becoming aware that somebody--or something--is carrying him through the air. He’s not dead, which is a surprise, though he feels paralyzed and his eyes are blurry. Iskall blinks to try to clear his vision and manages to focus enough to see that he’s being held by Mumbo, who is… looking very different, to say the least.

“We’re almost to another island,” Mumbo tells him. “You almost died there! I can’t believe you!” He shakes his head, and Iskall takes in the dark horns curling out of his head behind his ears with exhausted curiosity. “You’re lucky it was me and not one of the other Hermits, mate. I had to chase you into the void, and that’s not supposed to be survivable.”

Iskall’s still too frozen to speak, so he quickly looks Mumbo over. There’s the horns, and the purple eyes, and bursting from his shoulders and back is a huge pair of leathery black wings, with a matching scaly tail just below. His hands-- _ claws? _ \--are around Iskall’s back, so he can’t see them, but he can feel them digging into his skin through his jacket. All in all, either Iskall had neglected to notice something very important about his friend, or this is Mumbo’s half-dragon clone that had escaped from a lab somewhere. Iskall’s inclined to think the former. 

“Iskall?” Mumbo’s eyes narrow in concern as he looks down at the man he’s carrying in his arms. “You… you good, dude?”

“So that’s why you’re so good at flying,” Iskall blurts, surprising himself. “You’re a  _ dragon.” _ An Ender dragon, specifically. Iskall wonders if Mumbo’s always been like this, or if it was something that had been done to him, either by himself or someone else--then he thinks that might be an invasive question. He’s still feeling sluggish from his brief trip into the void.

Mumbo is looking increasingly awkward. “Er… part dragon, but yes,” he says, before swiftly changing the subject. “Look, there’s land!” Iskall can’t look, with the way Mumbo is carrying him. “Let’s see if we can fix your elytra. I’m not carrying you all the way back.”

He puts Iskall down against a large chorus plant and steps back. “How are you feeling?” Mumbo asks. “Can you stand? Do you need a golden apple? Do you  _ want _ a golden apple?” The barrage of questions makes Iskall’s head hurt. “Should I stop asking questions?”

“Please,” Iskall groans, attempting to sit up. “I never want to do that again.” He runs his fingers through his hair and takes the golden apple that Mumbo is offering him.

“If it’s any consolation, I never want you to do that again, either,” Mumbo put in. “As much as I would like to always be there to pull you out of the void, I won’t be.” He sighs. “I imagine you have… questions…?”

“I don’t want to pry,” Iskall says, shaking his head. He takes a few bites of the golden apple while Mumbo is quiet. “There’s probably a reason you’ve kept it a secret.”

“In that case, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone?” Mumbo’s voice pitched up at the end of his sentence in a hopeful manner.

“I won’t,” Iskall promises. “Does… does anybody else know, or is it just-”

“Just you. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I was already part dragon when you bound a dragon head to my face last season.” Mumbo laughs. “I can’t believe I didn’t give myself away during the whole Dragon Bros… cult thing.”

“Oh jeez, I’d actually forgotten about that,” Iskall admits with a chuckle. “Sorry?”

Mumbo waves a hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. It was fun.” He pauses. “Well, we’ve got some extra elytra if you want to use them? I hope they last all the way back--they  _ should, _ but you never know with unenchanted ones.” He helps Iskall pull the wrecked elytra off of his back, and Iskall looks at them sadly. “If all else fails, I don’t mind having to carry you a bit of the way, I’d just prefer not to be out in the open looking like… this.” He gestures to himself. “Who knows who else could be around here?”

Iskall thinks that Mumbo’s being overly paranoid, but that’s probably how nobody found out before this, so he’s not about to make a fuss about how his friend lives his life. “How about I fly in front this time?” he suggests. “Though it should be fine. I hope.” He laughs nervously.

Mumbo regards him curiously. “You  _ sure _ you don’t have any more questions about me before we head back?”

Iskall shakes his head. “If you want to tell me, then I’ll listen, but you’re still my friend, dragon or not. I don’t want to stick my nose into your business,” he says. “Let’s… let’s go home.” Iskall stands up, still feeling a bit shaky, and puts on the elytra Mumbo hands to him.

He looks over when he’s ready and watches as the air shimmers around his friend, and in barely a moment, he’s back to looking exactly how Iskall knows him. Mumbo opens his mouth to say something, then seems to think better of it and closes his mouth again. Iskall takes off, a little shaky in the air with the unfamiliar elytra, and then Mumbo joins him. 

They fly in silence for a few long moments, Iskall trying not to look down at the endless void, before Mumbo states, “Season 3.”

“What?”

“I became a dragon in Season 3,” Mumbo explains. “It was an accident. A really stupid one, actually. I was testing a machine… I thought I could use the dragon egg to create a strength buff or- or something. I don’t really remember.” He pauses. “It wasn’t supposed to do what it did. I thought it was safe.”

Iskall blinks at him. “It could have been worse?” he offers.

“You’re right,” Mumbo sighs. “Besides, I’ve gotten used to it. It’s… uncomfortable to hide it, and I can’t imagine life as a regular human anymore. Though, it’s kind of annoying when I’m trying to build something out of redstone and get excited and my wings blow the dust everywhere.” 

Iskall laughs, picturing the scenario in question. Then he pauses. “Mumbo… you know you can tell me anything.”

“I know, I know.” Mumbo hesitates. “There just wasn’t a good time to tell people, and it wasn’t really a big deal, and then I didn’t want to drop it on any new people, and it was hard to decide who to tell and who to leave out, so I just… kept it a secret.”

Then they both go quiet again.

* * *

The next time Iskall sees Mumbo is when he’s working on his tree and Mumbo decides to land directly in front of him to get his attention. He stumbles back, nearly tripping over a knot in the wood, but Mumbo swiftly catches him by the arm. Mumbo laughs.

“Stop startling me, Mumbo!” Iskall exclaims, but he’s not mad. “Have you completed your challenge?” He usually assumes whenever Mumbo turns up at his base it has something to do with Hermit Challenges. The End incident has almost completely slipped his mind.

“Ye-es, but that’s not why I’m here.” Mumbo awkwardly scratches the back of his head. “I came to say that I’m going to tell Grian. About… you know.” He smiles sheepishly.

Iskall’s expression becomes serious. “You’re sure?”

“Not really, but I think if anybody should know, it should be you two,” Mumbo says. “And you already know, so I have to tell Grian.”

“You don’t  _ have-” _

“I want to,” Mumbo interrupts. “Wish me luck?”

“Good luck, Mumbo,” Iskall says. “I don’t think it’s anything to be ashamed of, and Grian’s your friend. Besides, we’ve seen weirder.” He catches Mumbo by the arm and smiles reassuringly.

Mumbo laughs. “I suppose you’re right.” He grins, flashing sharp teeth and momentarily, purple sparks through his gaze. “I’ll come back after and tell you how it goes.”

Iskall hesitates, then pulls his friend into a hug. Mumbo initially freezes, then loosens up as he realizes what’s happening. “...Iskall?”

“It’ll be fine,” Iskall assures him quietly. “You’re Mumbo, you’ve always been Mumbo, and you’ll always be Mumbo. Nothing can change that.”

Mumbo sighs and pulls out of the hug. “Thanks, Iskall.” His elytra unfurl in what Iskall now realizes is a shoddy imitation of his real wings. “See you later!” And with that, Mumbo falls back off of the branch and streaks away through the clouds.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading my fic! Hopefully I didn't butcher anybody _too_ badly, I'm still only about 40 episodes into season 7 but I had to get this idea jotted down somewhere. I have a few other ideas for dragon!Mumbo stuff, so there might be a sequel or a second disconnected one-shot with a different take on the idea, but I'm not super sure yet!  
> As it says in the tags, this is my first Hermitcraft fic and I'm incredibly nervous about it, so kudos and comments are very appreciated <3  
> Update: If you enjoyed this fic, there is now a series called 'assorted dragon!mumbo fics' (should be easy enough to find) where i will be putting all of my dragon!mumbo fics (obviously) :>


End file.
